Allergy – psora

Allergy: The ontology of an itch

Allergies are a godsend, for they take us back to the root of things–that which is deep and perpetual within us all. It takes us back further than Leah or Jacob. It takes us to a primary itch within: who am I? Where do I come from? What is my purpose?

When I was 38 I noticed a strange scaly patch about the size of a silver dollar on the skin covering my right flank (quadratus lumborum), just below the last rib. I also began to see that certain shampoos would inflame a thin line of skin along my hairline, and when brushing my hair would note the snow shower of dried skin that would gently float down onto my shirt. This appalled me, for my mother had had a similar complaint when at 38 she developed scaly and dried palm and sole of foot on her right side. When I talked to her she recalled that one of her uncles had a severe case of psoriasis that had developed around (she couldn’t be specific) thirty-eight. This revelation of inheritance impassioned me to look more deeply into my complaint. As an osteopath and acupuncturist in the UK I had attempted to help those with skin problems and allergies and often found that my limited understanding could not help those who appeared more at distress than my relatively innocuous and hidden complaint.

— Solihin Thom

Ontology

During this time I had been developing an ontological system using kinesiology and mudras or hand modes–a (sign) language that allows people to give us feedback, a narrative, about the root of their problems, so that we can more efficiently know the causative reasons for their state. I used this system also and narrowed in to my own problems: to understand the itch and the psora within me.

Homeopathy – miasma and psora

Samuel Hahnemann, the German physician who put homeopathy on the medical map at the beginning of the eighteen hundreds, talked of inherited patterns or miasma (Greek for stain, and fog) that we all inherit genetically. These were predispositions to certain types of human diseases that could result in structural unease, states of pathophysiology, pathological disease and mental disorders. These patterns instructed us to play out genetic patterns of dysfunction.

Tsoret – psora – psoriasis – eczema – allergies

Hahnemann initially considered three primary miasma: 1] psora, 2] syphilis and 3] sycosis (gonorrhea) and then added a fourth which he called 4] tubercular. He thought the root miasm was psora. This word comes from the Hebrew tsoret which infers the anguish and pain Leah felt, consequent to Rachel being taken as a second wife. Leah, the older and less beautiful (sloe eyed) daughter, through a trick by Laban, their father, was secreted in to the marriage bed instead of Rachel. Leah was married then, via consummation, to Jacob. Jacob of course, discovered the ruse, and asked Laban for Rachel’s hand. With Laban’s consent, and for a further 7 years on tenured service, Jacob married Rachel a week later. However this marriage deeply hurt Leah, who did indeed love Jacob. She always felt unloved even though she bore six children to Jacob. She named her first three children; Reuben (affliction), Simeon (unloved), Levi (unattached) in reference to her anguish and pain towards her husband. Tsoret–psora–carries the taste of separation, outcast, unclean, barren, dirty, rebellious. We see that this stigma is carried through our inherited ‘lot’ and manifests primarily as skin problems (the visual representation of unclean or untouchable)–hence psoriasis and eczemas but also other hidden ‘itches’–as in all allergies.

Separation

This conceptual model can be used to uncover what our particular itch is. What we are separate from. Human beings undergo rites of passage, forgotten in our secular times–as we move through into differing parts of our journey or lives. We become, in effect, further away and more separate (unconscious) from the Source. We are birthed–thus are separated from the ‘heaven’ of the womb, weaned and separated from the primal maternal nourishment (hence often milk and dairy allergies), separated from the innocence and freedom of childhood as we go through puberty, separated from being carefree and unencumbered as youth, as we enter into the responsibility of marriage or partnership. As we work through adult life we are often separated from life as work and survival become intertwined, and it makes it difficult for a larger perspective or nous to arise within us, and as we retire, we again separate in our gradual preparation for death and all its uncertainty. In this life of ours we are then separated from truth, from the source, from real nourishment. We need a signal to help us come back on track.

Signals – the ‘itch’

The human body signals us when we are separated from something that we need to understand. To do so, it makes us react and itch to what we call an allergen–an irritant. In previous articles I have alluded to the human structure as if it were a house. That is; we consist of floors or areas of function within our body that mirror the functional aspects of a multi-storied house, containing basement (material nature), living rooms (vegetal nature), areas of privacy and territory (animal nature) and places where we manage the house and its function (human nature). Our real house may also mirror our sense of identity (Self); our colonial nature, American, Slav, Pole, Hispanic, African etc., through its design, décor, furnishings just as our body displays physiognomy, racial characteristics, color and other nuances.

Our body as a house, containing levels of consciousness and being

Material itch

Allergens act as irritants to each aspect of the house (body). Minute microscopic, barely animate objects–dust, fungus, mites, mold–‘stuff’ that we might find in the damp, dark and crowded basement will herald a primary inherited itch. Some small ‘seed’ left dormant setting off an ‘itch’ to signal its presence. It infers that we have some inherited itch which we need to resolve or conversely, some element which needs to come alive but is yet undifferentiated.

Vegetative itch

Food, primarily comes from the vegetal and animal realms, and which may invade the blood as long chain proteins (which are viewed as foreign) through a poorly differentiated and vulnerable digestive system (e.g. leaky gut) making us reactive albeit in a delayed manner. We then turn to absence and denial pushing aside the foods that would nourish our corporeal body–mirroring perhaps the lack of true nourishment in our inner or outer lives. The clues often, are illustrated by the food that we are irritated by. The root vegetable (grows hidden, deep in our the soil), the seeds that irritate imitating a dormant seed within us, fruit (of a feeling or emotion), grain (staff of life) or dairy (primary maternal nourishment) that does not animate or bring us into life–all contain a clue about what we our archetypal models of nourishment is; and of course what we are separate from. Hence the living room of our house is affected. We have difficulty fully living as we are nourished.

Instinctual itch

Similarly, those who get rhinitis, conjunctivitis or dermatitis and eczemas illustrate that the instinctual part of the self–the parts of the house that represents our territory or personal space–is absent in some way; we are not ‘at home’, not present but absent from our self or family. The first line of defense is then absent too–and thus the mucous membranes and skin lack their normal vigor–and do not do their job. Conversely we may be irritated with some part of our ambition, sexuality, drive, motivation or gender so we become irritated with animal by-products–dander and hair, skin of certain animals (probably their dander) to illustrate our own intolerance with this part of the self.

(Both human [man made] and identity [autoimmune] states are beyond the scope of this short article). Nevertheless human irritants are in the realm of beliefs, thought forms, archetypal patterns that sit on or in us. Noble patterns of allergy constitute irritability towards God, Higher ideas, etc lofty thoughts, and manifest as auto-immune incompetence (against self).

Allergies – the itch in our being

Allergies are merely the seed ‘nudge’ that highlight that which is hidden from us. Initially dust and mold, fungi and mites are of negligible or minor importance, so we don’t really ’see’ them as irritants.. The being, inherent within us, amps up the force of the initial irritant and makes us then become irritable with how we are nourished, or jacks up the power so much that we become absent or distracted so that our animal protective nature does not defend us from environmental pollutants, pollens and the like. The wisdom within us is extraordinary. Our being wants us to sit up and take notice. Unfortunately as our medicine is often based on pharmaceutical intervention we use either conventional means that mask the symptoms or ‘alternatives’ that fortify our systems but actually do a similar job. Alternative medicine is often a soft medicine, as it tries to alter the environment of the person–our physiology–to mitigate the effects of an irritant or calm down the hypersensitivity. It doesn’t always get at the root; albeit homeopathy certainly tries to do so. Our modern approach is to talk about mind body and spirit, play lip service to the mind, notice the body but often do not really understand that it is Spirit that provides the gift by giving us the itch. Our essence cries to us about our Original Promise–what we came into this life to change, alter, transform, grow through.

An ontological approach

There are simple procedures that help to ease and remove the allergy. This is by looking at the root cause within you, and noting the area that is affected which serves as the clue. For example, the basement serves us to point and look at inherited patterns that lie dormant yet present within us. Perhaps there are things ‘dead’ within us, so that fungus gets a hold on our decaying part of us. Perhaps there is a dead or dormant feeling running through us, so our digestive tract fills with candida albicans as the mycelia entangle our genitals and innards with their tentacles. This makes us feel unclean and perhaps inhibits intimacy, as the feeling (vegetal self) within, that entangles, may simply be one that pushes us away from our sexuality (animal self). Simple processes help to break the incessant noise in the system to break the facilitated mechanism that constantly trips us into the allergic response. You almost never have to take people off foods, nor rotate diets, give shots or mask the symptoms–there is no need to. Once listened to, the being stabilizes its housing and the functional parts of us go back to their normal and usually silent job.